Penne all’arrabiata

Recently I’ve been providing more complicated recipes that aren’t on the cheaper side of the frugal scale. Whilst they are still very cheap, I can do better, so I will. There really is nothing nicer than a good, traditional pasta sauce, with simple, yet delicious flavours that don’t try to do anything too complicated. For this reason I have found that basic pasta sauces based around tomato always taste better without any tomato puree or balsamic vinegar, to name but two examples. It is my opinion that the most that should be added are more basic ingredients, chilli or basil for instance.

Having said all that it should be pointed out that the flavours that are involved should be intense and very present, there’s nothing worse than a bland, watery pasta sauce. To help the consistency of the dish I’d also recommend employing the use of a pasta which will hold the sauce well such as fusilli or penne. It is probably best to avoid spaghetti based pasta such as pici or linguine.

This dish it incredibly simple, but gives a really good taste to time ratio as it will take around half an hour from prep to plate, if you’re quick. The recipe will feed two people.

Penne all’arrabiata {recipe}

Serves 2

Ingredients:

200g pasta

400g tin chopped tomatoes

1 medium onion, diced

1 pepper, diced

1 clove of garlic, crushed

1 chilli with or without seeds, diced

small amount of parmesan to serve, cheddar will also do

olive oil

seasoning

Method:

Fry off the onion, pepper, garlic and chilli in a pan with a good drizzle of olive oil, until the onion is translucent. To this add the tomatoes and a dash of water, cook over a medium heat for around 20 minutes, add extra water if necessary. Season to taste. Put the pasta on to boil 10 minutes before the dish is ready to serve. Add the sauce to the drained pasta and mix thoroughly, top with a small amount of parmesan cheese.

Cost: Each portion of this dish will cost around 40p to make and it couldn’t be more delicious. Now that is frugal!